Sustainable Development Goals: Another wasteful venture for Kenya?

The world recently approved the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). As a development professional focused on water and sanitation across Kenya, I’m mostly concerned with SDG 6; access to safe water for all by 2030.

And while this is an admirable goal, along with the rest of the SDGs, I don’t believe the SDGs are a helpful model for Kenya or the rest of the world. Instead of prescribing a broad set of 17 goals for the world, we should instead be guided by a country’s own development priorities. Only then will we be able to come close to making sustainable progress.